


grey morality

by whichlights



Series: some kind of redemption [1]
Category: Loki: Agent of Asgard, Marvel Cinematic Universe, Thor (Movies)
Genre: @infinity war writers hire me, Gen, Genderfluid Loki (Marvel), Infinity Gauntlet, Infinity Gems, Loki (Marvel)-centric, Magic, Resurrection, The Tesseract (Marvel), i absolutely just adapted the plot of aoa to make it mcu friendly and also a bit more Mine, major character... not-death?
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-01-06
Updated: 2018-01-06
Packaged: 2019-03-01 08:23:42
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,410
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13290936
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/whichlights/pseuds/whichlights
Summary: The raven cocked its head at him. “Beware,” it cawed. “That which is called ego-death is coming to you.”Loki watched as it shook itself, getting dust off its wings, and flew away.





	grey morality

The Tesseract wasn’t in Loki’s pocket, but that didn’t mean he didn’t have it.

Really, it was in his pocket  _ dimension _ . He’d created it a few minutes into being on the Ark- it had been in his pocket until then -and it was only accessible via the Tesseract itself. Which meant Loki had craftily created a space where he had the Tesseract, and only he could access it. 

He’d seen it in the vault, the crown in his hands, Ragnarok on the horizon. He didn’t know why he grabbed it from the vault. Maybe old habits died hard.

He remembered the first time he’d come into contact with the Tesseract. Raw energy. Raw power. He couldn’t just let it burn on the bonfire Asgard was about to become. Loki wasn’t sure it could, but if anyone had the Tesseract, he wanted it to be him.

They’d come to Earth, and the Ark was placed somewhere in the wilderness. They were staying on the Ark, while Thor dragged the Valkyrie, the Hulk, and Loki to New York, something about meeting up with the Avengers.

That was all Then.

Now, Loki was listening to the Avengers rattle on about how to save the world, or something.

Black Widow had caught the Hulk and Thor up to date on everything (no one gave Loki a nice little lecture about the complexities of their current relationships with the other half of the Avengers, but he was caught up all the same) and Iron Man wasn’t in his suit, instead lounging back, feet kicked up on the table with a drink.

“We need to gather the others, mend ties with them,” Thor said. “Thanos is more powerful than you can imagine. We need to be united to defeat him, and even then-”

“What about Reindeer Games over there?” Iron Man waved a hand in Loki’s vague direction. “What, you don’t have some sway with your old boss?”

“I prefer not to think about that time,” Loki said, giving Iron Man his coldest glare. Iron Man just shrugged and went back to his drink.

“What Loki does or does not have is no concern,” Thor said.

_ Yes, whether or not I have the Tesseract is no concern, carry on with your petty mortal problems.  _ Loki remembered no one knew he had the Tesseract. He was strangely very-concerned about them finding out he did. Maybe he should just keep it in it’s pocket dimension. Maybe he should find a way to destroy it.

But what kind of person would he be to give up such power?

\---

The birds were behaving strangely. Loki stood on the wide open area near the top of Stark Tower, watching the pigeons swirl in odd patterns, purposeful and screaming.

Loki leaned over the railing, trying to figure out if it was a panic response, the Titan’s doing, or something stranger. A bird landed next to him on the railing. It wasn’t a pigeon: it was a raven, with stark black feathers and a jagged line down its beak. Loki was reminded of his father’s ravens.

Strange.

“Beware,” the raven said.

Loki looked at it with new eyes. “Father?” He questioned it hesitantly.

The raven cocked its head at him. “Beware,” it cawed. “That which is called ego-death is coming to you.”

Loki watched as it shook itself, getting dust off its wings, and flew away.

Loki went back inside the tower, shaking the feeling of dread off just as easily. “Thor,” he called. “Has anyone reported talking birds?”

Thor looked up from his arm wrestle with the Valkyrie, which caused him to lose. “No. Why?”

“I was just observing the birds. The pigeons are flying strangely, and I wanted to know if any other strange occurrences have happened,” Loki gave him the best kind of lie- a half truth. 

“If the birds have started talking, I haven’t heard anything about it.”

“That’s all I wanted to know.” Loki walked away. An omen, then. Meant just for him. 

_ That which is called ego-death is coming to you. _

\---

Thanos’ ship landed in Central Park. 

Loki had warned them. He’s warned them so many times, so no one could say he didn’t.  _ Thanos’ power is beyond your mortal weapons _ , he’d said. It would have been rude to say “mortal comprehension.”

The Avengers went out to face him anyways.

_ “Why?” Loki asked Thor as he donned his armor. “Why would you go to face him when you know there is no chance?” _

_ “No chance, but there is hope.” _

_ “You and your  _ hope _ can enjoy playing martyr without me.” _

Loki sat on the ledge of Stark Tower now, watching the explosions and the fire from out of the corner of his eye. The birds were acting up again, but there were no more ravens.

JARVIS said, “there is someone waiting for you downstairs.”

“Oh, finally,” Loki huffed, skipping the stairs two steps at a time. “Let him up.” Loki was very glad he’d hacked JARVIS’s systems in his off time, because now the thing listened to him. Much easier than making phone calls himself.

Loki’s guest (guest _ s _ \- he’d brought friends) met him in the lobby. Loki got there second, but he had been on the roof, so it was fair.

“Took your time,” Loki huffed, arms crossed.

“Give me one reason to trust you,” the man he’d originally invited said, his shield up and ready.

“Because if someone is going to martyr themself, I don’t want it to be my brother,” Loki said honestly, but it was taken as a lie. He sighed. “People will die if you don’t,” he said. “Thanos will kill everyone on this planet to get what he wants, and he’ll start with your friends, and he’ll start with New York.”

Captain America nodded grimly. “What you’re saying is I don’t have a choice?”

“You always have a choice,” Loki said. 

“Sometimes you really don’t.”

“All that means is you’ve already made up your mind.”

Captain America turned to his friends. “Sam, you’re the fastest with those wings. Go and provide air support until we get there, okay?”

“Got it.” The man Captain America had addressed ran off, jumping up off the sidewalk and flying away with metal wings. 

“A raven?” Loki asked, because he was still cautiously looking for omens.

“A falcon,” Captain America corrected. “Now, you coming or not?”

“What?”

“Are you coming to help?”

“I did help. I called you.”

“I doubt our Earth weapons will hurt this guy. Your magic would really make a difference.”

“No, it wouldn’t.” Maybe. Loki didn’t know. 

“I’m offering you a choice, Loki.”

“And I’ve already made up my mind.”

\---

Loki wasn’t a hero-type. 

He wasn’t moral most of the time, and he cared too much about being unpredictable, about mischief, to really stick to being the good guy. Sometimes he was helpful, but he just simply wasn’t a hero.

Loki was the villain to Thor’s shining hero. The man in the shadows, the story told around a campfire. To every hero there was a villain, it was just fate. Destiny.

But he didn’t want to be a  _ villain _ . 

He sighed, and grabbed a knife from among Black Widow’s myriad of them, and went off to go be a hero-type.

Central Park was in chaos by the time he got there. The trees were dead and bare, and the grass was yellowed. Loki looked for the one person he really cared about, the one person he wanted to be okayish.

Thor didn’t have his hammer, but he was covered in arcs of lightning, sparking blue and formidable. One of Thanos’ minions, a robot creature with glowing eyes, was sneaking up behind him,its claw of an arm raised to strike. Loki threw his knife, and it landed right between those glowing eyes, and it fell with a scream.

Thor looked at Loki, and gave him a sharp nod. “That was my only knife!” Loki yelled, slightly exasperated. “So don’t make me save your ass again!”

Thor tossed Loki his knife back, and continued to reign havoc on Thanos’ troops. 

He was really the only one making any progress. The rest of the Avengers, the good guys, were failing. Their mortal weapons were useless against a force of this strength, and even the Valkyrie was failing against the tide. The goal here wasn’t defeating Thanos, it was containing his forces, giving civilians time to escape.

Thanos hadn’t come out of his ship yet. Loki did not look at it to see if he would. The Tesseract’s pocket dimension was weightless, but Loki felt like it was heavy in his pocket. Thanos wanted it. He knew he did.

A man, all red, started flying past. “Sorry I’m late,” he said cheerfully, effortlessly blasting one of Thanos’ minions into dust. “Wanda and I were talking through some things.” 

“Glad to see you, Vis,” Captain America yelled, throwing his shield at another minion.

Loki narrowed his eyes at the newcomer. Magic spilled off of him, tainting the air. Familiar magic. “You didn’t,” he whispered to nothing. “Tell me you didn’t.”

They _made a creature_ out of magic similar to the Tesseract. Not _the_ Tesseract, because Loki had that, and it still had magic. This magic felt like a parallel line to it. Ancient, powerful, and loosely uncontrollable. And they made a man out of it.

Were. They.  _ Idiots _ .

Thanos had an obsession with magic like the Tesseract. Infinity stones, Loki had heard him call them once. This man was now going to be a target, and Loki didn’t know what would come of it. He didn’t know what would come of playing with ancient magics. 

Loki slashed at one of Thanos’ minions, and a raven flew at him. “Beware,” it started to croak. Loki threw his knife at it, and it stopped, dead. Now was not the time for omens.

Thanos’ ship door started to open, and Loki fled.

\---

New York was not destroyed, but that was only because Thanos had what he came for. Loki heard it from Thor- Thanos had pried the infinity stone right out of Vision’s head, and added it to his glove. The Tesseract felt like a heavier not-weight in Loki’s pocket dimension.

Black Panther, the king of Wakanda, offered them tentative refuge. He wanted to defeat Thanos too, and teaming up was the best way to do that. Loki, however much he didn’t like it, could agree with that. Wakanda’s forces were a welcome addition to their forces. 

Iron Man, in an effort to boost morale, said he might be able to get Vision back if they recovered the stone. Loki thought he was an idiot, but mortals tended to rely on their hope, so he didn’t crush it.

“Why is he here,” Hawkeye said, not looking at Loki, but gesturing with an arrow in his direction.

“He is my brother. I trust him.” Thor crossed his arms.

“I’m being helpful,” Loki said. “You’re welcome.”

“He’s a lil’ bitch,” the Valkyrie said. “But he hasn’t stabbed Thor in, like, a week.”

Loki shot her a glare. “I am  _ being helpful _ .”

The Valkyrie shrugged and went to down shots with Iron Man.

Loki went outside for a walk. Honestly, he was rather proud of them, in a way, for not trusting him. He’d done horrible things in the past. They weren’t total idiots after all. It was annoying when he was honestly trying to be helpful, though. He wasn’t asking them to forgive him, or like him, just to trust him. Midgardians seemed to think the ideas had to coexist.

Wakanda had many things. It had vibranium, which Captain America’s shield was made from. It had technology. It had people. 

Wakanda did not have ravens. Loki knew this because he’d looked it up. And he’d asked their King, which had earned him a strange look, but an affirmation that there were, in fact, no ravens native to Wakanda.

Which is why the raven perching on a bush, tilting its head at him, was somehow a surprise and a not-surprise.

Loki looked at it tiredly. “What?”

“Beware,” the raven said, fluffing out its feathers to look bigger.

“Anything else?”

“Trickster. Shapeshifter. Listen well. That which is called ego-death is coming to you.”

“Anything  _ else _ ?” Loki asked, irritated. “Odin’s beard, if you’re going to give me ominous messages, I’d like more details.”

“Remember,” the raven cawed, and flew off. 

Loki huffed. “I hate omens.”

\---

Thanos was in the news, and his glove had a new gem, sparkling green.

Black Widow shot the TV with one of her hand guns and went right back to cleaning it. The TV crackled, fizzled out and died, the screen a mass of grey and white buzz.

“Wasn’t that the jewel that Strange man was wearing?” Thor asked. 

“You went looking for infinity stones, and missed one  _ right in front of you _ ?” The Hulk laughed at him, if only to lighten the mood.

“Strange is resourceful,” Iron Man said. “I’m sure he’s fine.” 

Loki just tilted his head at the broken screen. Letting people live wasn’t Thanos’ style. Strange, and likely anyone who had associated with him, was dead.

Loki wondered exactly how safe and impenetrable his Tesseract pocket dimension was. He didn’t want to die. As long as he was the only person who could access the Tesseract, his life had value.

Loki was glad he didn’t let it burn.

He kept thinking about his last bargaining chip, tucked away safely in his pocket, as the Avengers planned their next move. They wanted to draw Thanos out, and defeat him. Loki didn’t mention how stupid that was, though he gave Thor a look. Thor didn’t answer it, just continuing to talk with the new space people he’d found, the so called Guardians of the Galaxy. They had a talking racoon and a Groot.

“We don’t know anything about this guy,” Captain America said. “How do we devise a strategy?”

Thor looked at Loki with the puppy dog eyes he used to give him when they were younger. Thor wanted Loki to help his friends. Loki sighed. “Alright, listen well, because I’m  _ not _ going to repeat myself.”

\---

Loki wandered the streets of Wakanda, and no one paid him any mind. A flock of ravens- a conspiracy of ravens -followed him from afar, but never cawed out any warnings, so he paid them no mind.

The streets were quiet at this time of night, and Loki didn’t know where he was going, but he was going somewhere, and it was important. He took a winding trail he’d never seen before, and ended up in the jungle. It was also quiet.

“Loki,” a soft, familiar voice called. 

Loki turned, and Odin was standing in front of him, arms open wide.

“Loki,” Odin said kindly. “My child who is both son and daughter.”

Loki blinked, and looked at Odin like he’d been slapped. “I never told you that,” he said. “I’ve never told  _ anyone  _ that. How do you know that?”

“I am the All-Father,” Odin smiled. “I know all that you are, and I love you.”

Loki scoffed at that. “If you know what I’ve done-”

“I know what you  _ are _ . I know what you can be. You could be so much more. That does not make me love you any less.”

Loki looked around. The trees were still, silent. “Why are you here?”

“Because I am here to give you a message. The hour is near. You need to rely on  _ your _ power. Prove yourself worthy, god of lies. Remember.”

Ravens started to swoop down at Loki, clawing at his hair and screaming. “Beware! Beware!”

“Father-” Loki started, swatting away the birds and reaching out to Odin, but Odin was fading away.

“Remember what a lie is. Hold fast to yourself, to what you love, or you will be lost forever.”

“Beware!” The ravens screamed.

“Father!” Loki called out desperately. He just had to get past the ravens, and he could get to Odin. To safety. 

“Beware,” Odin whispered. “That which is called ego-death is coming to you.”

Loki woke up with a start.

\---

“I’m not going to fight Thanos,” Loki said.

“You promised you’d help,” Captain America said petulantly. Black Widow started to polish her gun. 

“And I will,” Loki said defensively. “But I  _ like  _ living. I’m not going to face Thanos.”

“Then how in the hell are you going to help?” The Falcon asked, arms crossed.

Loki looked to the Black Panther. “With your permission, I’d like to evacuate the remaining citizens of Wakanda. The children, their parents, all who can’t or don’t want to fight.”

“Like we’re going to leave you alone with a bunch of children,” Scarlet Witch scoffed. 

Loki kept looking at the King. He continued, “I can protect them with my magic, and if all else fails and Thanos wins Earth, I know a place where I may still have some sway. A planet called Sakaar. It’s a place for outcasts, which they’ll be if Thanos wins, but they’ll be safe there.”

“You promise to protect my people?” The King looked at him. Loki nodded. The others trusted his judgement of character. So when Black Panther said, “thank you, Liesmith,” the others who had been glaring at him relented.

Loki caught Thor just before he went out to face the mass of Thanos’ forces that had amassed on Wakanda’s border, lead by the Titan himself. Loki grabbed his arm and looked at him, but couldn’t figure out what to say. Nothing seemed appropriate.  _ Hey, you’re off to face my old boss, under whose orders I tried to take over the entire Earth, and I know I made it seem like I hated you but really you’re my brother and I love you and so can you do your best to not die please because I won’t be there to save your ass this time. _

Loki took his only knife from his belt and gave it to Thor, and walked away without a word.

\---

Loki sheltered the citizens of Wakanda that hadn’t already evacuated, around twenty in all, in a magical dome of sorts. The rest of the population were either gone or off fighting. Loki understood fighting to protect your home, but he had self preservation. He knew when a battle couldn’t be fought and won. 

He wasn’t surprised when the Avengers and Wakandans staggered towards his magical barrier, exhausted and bloodied. He lowered it momentarily to let them in so they could start to tend their wounds. His eyes scanned the group, smaller than it had been, and he frowned. He walked up to the Black Widow. “Where’s Thor?” He asked.

The Black Widow just shrugged.

Loki asked around. Iron Man gave him a pitying look, which made Loki want to throw him out another window. The talking raccoon cussed at him, and Loki cussed right back. The Hulk said he didn’t know, and he was  _ lying _ .

Loki strode up to the Valkyrie, who was tending a deep gash on her arm. “Where. Is. My. Brother,” he grit out between his teeth. Magic was on the edge of his system, pooling in his hands.

The Valkyrie shook her head, taking a gulp of the brandy she was using to sterilize her arm. “Thanos got him.”

Loki went slack. He felt the world spin on its axis. He felt the rotation under his feet. He felt the spin of the Earth at it’s thousands-of-miles-per-hour speed one of the scientists on the team could tell him the exact number for. That was the only explanation. He’d opened himself up to all that sensation, because it was the only reason the world would go so topsy-turvy, why he would stumble backwards, why his head hurt, why nothing felt right.

“Where’s his shroud,” Loki managed to rasp out. “Where’s his body?”

The Valkyrie just shook her head again. “As far as I know, he wasn’t dead when Thanos grabbed him.”

Oh. Oh, of course. Of course.

Loki started to laugh. Everyone backed away from him, and he laughed harder. Oh,  _ of course _ . “It’s me he wants,” Loki laughed. “Of course.”

“What do you mean, of course?” The Falcon demanded. 

“I have the Tesseract,” Loki laughed. 

Immediately, every weapon in the vicinity was pointed at him. “You  _ what _ ?” Iron Man snapped.

“I have the Tesseract,” Loki laughed harder, so hard it hurt. “I stole it from Odin’s vault while Asgard was burning, and I’ve hidden it so only I can get it. Thanos wants the Tesseract, so he needs me.”

“You-” the Hulk started, but Loki laughed and interrupted him.

“So he takes Thor. Thanos doesn’t do hostages, he doesn’t do captives- Strange is  _ dead _ .” He looked pointedly at Iron Man. “Thor is alive because he needs me alive and he needs my cooperation and-”

Loki broke off laughing. He laughed because if he didn’t he would cry, and he wouldn’t cry in front of these people. 

“You’re insane,” Scarlet Witch tells him. He doesn’t mind it.

Loki started to leave. The Falcon put a wing in front of him. “Where do you think you’re going?” He demanded.

“You think you can stop me?” Loki’s eyes were hard, his hands glittering with magic. 

“You can’t give him the Tesseract!” Iron Man snapped.

From his stretch bed, Captain America yelled, “Loki can make his own damn choices!”

“You are  _ not  _ turning  _ my  _ brother into one of  _ your  _ arguments!” Loki yelled.

Captain America looked at him. “You can make your own choices. But for what my opinion is worth, I don’t think you should give him the Tesseract.”

“I don’t remember caring for your opinion.”

“You and Thor don’t even like each other! You hate him!” The Valkyrie yells.

_ Says who _ , Loki wants to scream. There’s a raven in a tree, but it doesn’t speak. It just looks at him, with glowing blue eyes. 

“I won’t do it,” Loki said, putting an air as if he’s calmed down, as if his previous outburst was just emotional. As if the world still isn’t spinning under him. “That was just… I wasn’t thinking straight.”

No one seems convinced, but they go off to do their own thing, at least. Loki is left to sit under a tree where he has a good look at the raven. It continues to stare at him until he leaves.

\---

Loki leaves that night, of course.

Of course.

He had a choice, obviously, but not much of one. He also had a plan. The Tesseract felt like a heavier weight than usual.

He should have let it burn.

She should have let it burn.

Her cloak flapped around her like a pair of wings. Then it became one, fabric to feathers. And she was a bird- a raven, how fitting -flying through the sky. 

The battlefield wasn’t hard to find. Parts of it were still on fire. Loki circled it once or twice, looking for traps, but only saw Thanos’ ship, right in the thick of it all. She flew down to the ground, turning just before she landed on the ground. Shee stood up, brushing the burned grass off of her leggings. 

Thanos was sitting on a temporary throne. Loki walked up to him. “Where is my brother,” she said, and got a laugh.

Thanos leaned forward, the jewels on his glove glowing. How many people had died for those sparkly trinkets. (Did Thor have to be one of them.) “Oh look, brotherly love,” he drawled, and Loki didn’t wince at  _ brother _ , “here to save the day and damn it. No declaration about how you don’t care about him?”

Loki straightened her spine, not letting everything on the inside show on the outside. She portrayed herself as she always did- cool, confident, detached, powerful, and male. “If you believed that, Thor would be back with his friends.”

Thanos laughed. He held out his ungloved hand. “The Tesseract.”

“Where is my brother?” Loki insisted. 

“Around.”

“I want your word he won’t be harmed,” Loki said in her best negotiator voice, which was a very good negotiator voice. “Before, or after I give you the Tesseract. You will not give the order, you will not allow your minions to hurt him, and you will not arrange in any form or fashion for him to be harmed. This applies to physical and physiological harm.”

Thanos laughed. “Always the little dealmaker. Alright. You have my word.”

“What happens if you break it?”

“I die,” Thanos said sarcastically. “Now, the Tesseract.”

“Bring Thor out. We hand over at the same time. No Thor, no Tesseract.”

Thanos seemed tired of this, and slightly annoyed. “Fine.” He nodded to one of his minions. “Fetch the godling.”

Loki reached into her coat pocket, hand in the pocket dimension, and silently started to cast the most complicated spell she’d ever concocted. If it failed, she would end up killing herself, Thor, and Thanos. If it went right, that wouldn’t happen.

Thor’s wrists were chained together, and his eyepatch had been ripped away, but he looked otherwise mostly unharmed. Loki ripped her gaze away from him, and then took the Tesseract out of her pocket dimension.

She held it up, offering it to Thanos in exchange for her brother.

Thor was unceremoniously shoved forward. He stumbled and landed at her feet. “Loki, brother-” he started.

Loki looked at him sadly. And she activated the spell she’d made with the phrase she’d chosen- “I’m your sister.”

The Tesseract started to glow, and flare, and send off spikes of energy. Loki threw out her free hand, and Thor was dragged by an invisible force behind her and to the left. That was the important part. 

“What are you doing?” Thanos demanded as the Tesseract’s energy arced towards him.

And then two things happened at once.

  1. The Tesseract exploded, shooting twin beams of pure energy at both Loki and Thanos. Loki and Thanos, despite being different distances from the Tesseract, were hit in the chest at the same time.
  2. Loki’s spell was completed. It was several parts, but in essence, she was creating a force that was equal and opposite. The beams of energy were aimed- one to trap in a pocket dimension, only accessible using the Tesseract, and one to kill, annihilate, dispatch, destroy utterly. The spell wouldn’t have worked unless those two options were linked, together. Trapped life and free death. Equal, complimentary energies. The Tesseract exploding released those energies, destroying itself to complete the spell.



There was a heartbeat or two before the next things that happened at the same time.

  1. Thanos screamed.
  2. Loki died.



(Before she died, she fell back, to the left, and Thor caught her. She shifted one last time, to a feminine form. She had two thoughts.

  1. _I die as myself._
  2. _I didn’t get to tell him sorry.)_



\---

Loki exhaled, and looked around.

The sky- was it a sky? -was green, with shadows on the black horizon- was it a horizon? -and there was a pedestal with a very familiar crown with horns, and a very familiar woman stood beside that crown.

“Where am I?” He asked. 

“This is a metaphorical space,” Loki’s mother said. “It doesn’t really exist. There is no  _ where _ for you to be.”

Loki realized he wasn’t breathing. His heart wasn’t beating. “I’m dead,” he said.

“Maybe,” Frigga said.

Loki looked at the crown again. “Why is that there?” He asked.

A raven flying overhead- because there were still ravens in a place that didn’t exist -yelled, “THAT WHICH IS CALLED EGO-DEATH-”

“Hush,” Frigga admonished it. “Now is a time of decisions, bird of ill omen, and you should hold your tongue.”

Frigga looked back at Loki to answer his question. “That’s one of your choices.”

“I have choices?”

“Yes, of course.”

“What are they?”

“You won’t like them if I tell you.”

“Tell me anyways.”

“You can put on that helmet and return as everyone expects you to- as a conqueror of the world. Thanos is defeated, and the Avengers are weak. The Earth is yours for the taking.”

Loki bit his lip. “And what’s the other choice?”

“You disappear into the void, forever. Killed, annihilated, dispatched. Destroyed utterly.”

Loki gave her a weak smile. “You’re right, I don’t like those options.”

“I’m sorry.”

Loki looked at the crown. It was covered in green fire, but gave off no heat. Loki reached to touch it, then thought better of that. “Mother, what is-” he turned, and she was gone.

“... ego-death,” he finished softly. 

Loki took a step back from the crown. 

He didn’t want to be evil. He didn’t want to be the conqueror. He didn’t want Earth. Once upon a time, he did, back when he thought power was the only way to be Thor’s equal, but now he didn’t.

He also didn’t want to die.

What did he want?

“A clean slate,” Loki answered out loud. 

A raven overhead called out to him, “Remember.”

Loki tried to follow its flight path, figure out where it was, where it was going, but it was gone before he could spot the thing. 

Remember. 

_ Remember what?  _ He wondered. He thought back to Odin in his dream.  _ Remember what a lie is. _

_ What is a lie _ ? Loki wondered.  _ What does it mean to be the god of lies? _

A lie is another kind of power, intricately woven, and people want to believe it. They get lost in it. A lie was a little like magic. Magic was about taking the subtleties of the universe and bending them in a way that suited the purpose of the magic user. A lie was not true, though, and magic was very true, very real.

A story wasn’t real, and it never lost any of its power. Loki remembered sitting around a fire with Thor and Thor’s friends, and they told stories. Not all of the stories were true, but no one called them a lie. A story was intricate, a kind of power that went beyond a lie. People want to believe a story.

A lie was just a story told. But somehow a story was different. Better, even.

What did it mean to be the god of lies? The god of pure untruths? Who would want to be that? A story was untrue, yes, but loved for it. A story was fluid, changing, and defied the destiny that said it had to be one thing. There was not just one story. 

Loki looked at the crown. It was different now- one horn was missing, and it was less of a helmet and more of a  _ crown _ . He’d called it a crown before, but this was a thing of nobility, of change.

Loki was not a hero. Loki didn’t want to be a villain. What Loki wanted was to  _ change _ .

He’d been told he had two options- conqueror or martyr. 

“I’m not big on binaries,” he said out loud. “I’m making my  _ own _ option.”

“The hour is now, o nobly born,” a raven called again. 

Loki took the crown in his hands. The green fire didn’t go away and it didn’t burn him. “I am Loki… Odinson.” It felt right. “I have a brother, whom I love,” he whispered. “And I will not sit in any box built for me. I am myself. These things are right. These things are true. These things I’ll keep. As for the rest… I’ll tell a new story. A better one.”

Loki screwed his eyes shut and put on the crown. The fire licked at his hands. It engulfed him. And then-

-his eyes flew open, and he gasped.

\---

**AVENGER DATABASE >PROFILES>ALLIES**

**LOKI ODINSON**

**BROTHER OF THOR AND HELA, SON** ****  
**OF ODIN AND FRIGGA** **  
** **GOD OF MISCHIEF AND LIES**

**ONCE POSSESSED THE TESSERACT**

**POWERS:** ****  
**MAGIC (NOT MUCH KNOWN)** ****  
**MASTERFUL LIAR** ****  
**SHAPESHIFTER** ****  
**ILLUSIONIST** ****  
**MANIPULATION AND TRICKERY** **  
** **GOOD WITH KNIVES**

**OTHER:** ****  
**MOSTLY SELFISH, BUT WILLING TO** ****  
**COMPROMISE TO GET WHAT HE WANTS** ****  
**FICKLE LOYALTY** ****  
**UNTRUSTWORTHY  
THOR MISSES HIM**

**STATUS:** **  
** **DECEASED**

\---

EIGHT MONTHS LATER

\---

Somewhere in partially rebuilt New York, there was a flash of green fire. A man stumbled out of it, brushing off the smoke from his clothes. No one noticed him, and he didn’t notice anyone.

He stepped into the light, looking at his hands, his body, his feet. He rolled his shoulders, rolled his neck, cracked his fingers. He gave a deep breath. 

Loki stepped out onto the sidewalk, and said to himself and the air and the world, "being reborn is such a hassle."

**Author's Note:**

> my tumblr is witchlightsands, and you can also check me out at my marvel side blog genderfluid-loki


End file.
